ion of the young dreamer had for its
starting-point leaps, claws, and teeth. . . The soul of another is
darkness, and a cat's soul more than most, but how near the visions
just described are to the truth may be seen from the following fact:
under the influence of his day-dreams the kitten suddenly leaped
up, looked with flashing eyes at Praskovya, ruffled up his coat,
and making one bound, thrust his claws into the cook's skirt.
Obviously he was born a mouse catcher, a worthy son of his bloodthirsty
ancestors. Fate had destined him to be the terror of cellars,
store-rooms and cornbins, and had it not been for education . . .
we will not anticipate, however.

On his way home from the high school, Pyotr Demyanitch went into a
general shop and bought a mouse-trap for fifteen kopecks. At dinner
he fixed a little bit of his rissole on the hook, and set the trap
under the sofa, where there were heaps of the pupils' old exercise-books,
which Praskovya used for various domestic purposes. At six o'clock
in the evening, when the worthy Latin master was sitting at the
table correcting his pupils' exercises, there was a sudden "klop!"
so loud that my uncle started and dropped his pen. He went at once
to the sofa and took out the trap. A neat little mouse, the size
of a thimble, was sniffing the wires and trembling with fear.

"Aha," muttered Pyotr Demyanitch, and he looked at the mouse
malignantly, as though he were about to give him a bad mark. "You
are cau--aught, wretch! Wait a bit! I'll teach you to eat my grammar!"

Having gloated over his victim, Poytr Demyanitch put the mouse-trap
on the floor and called:

"Praskovya, there's a mouse caught! Bring the kitten here!

"I'm coming," responded Praskovya, and a minute later she came in
with the descendant of tigers in her arms.

"Capital!" said Pyotr Demyanitch, rubbing his hands. "We will give
him a lesson. . . . Put him down opposite the mouse-trap . . .
that's it. . . . Let him sniff it and look at it. . . . That's
it. . . ."

The kitten looked wonderingly at my uncle, at his arm-chair, sniffed
the mouse-trap in bewilderment, then, frightened probably by the
glaring lamplight and the attention directed to him, made a dash
and ran in terror to the door.

"Stop!" shouted my uncle, seizing him by the tail, "stop, you rascal!
He's afraid of a mouse, the idiot! Look! It's a mouse! Look! Well?
Look, I tell you!"

Pyotr Demyanitch took the kitten by the scruff of the neck